Photo Albums Are History Thanks to FaceBook

The increasing trend of sharing photographs online on social networking sites heralds the end of the traditional family photo album, a new UK study has found.

The increasing trend of sharing photographs online on social networking sites heralds the end of the traditional family photo album, a new UK study has found.

Two-thirds of Britons now prefer to catalogue their pictures on computers, tablets or smartphones instead of displaying their photos in old-fashioned albums.

Just a third of those questioned said they still displayed images using an old-fashioned book, while 53 per cent claimed they preferred to use Facebook.

The South Korean firm, Samsung, analysed the responses of 3,000 people collected by OnePoll for the study. It found that a mere 13 per cent of 18 to 24-year-olds had ever used an album, The Telegraph reported.

Around one in five people said they take photos with the intention of posting them on sites such as Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, with 10 per cent saying their snaps were uploaded onto a website in less than a 60 seconds after they had been shot on a smartphone.

Another trend that was observed in the study was that young people now take more pictures of themselves than friends and family.

The "selfies", where the photographer takes photos of themselves by holding their camera at arm's length, have become the most popular image captured by young people.

They now account for 30 per cent of pictures taken by those aged 18-24, with men taking more photos of themselves than women, according to the poll.

"The growing trend in sharing photography online is also resulting in the death of the photo album," Samsung said.

People are now taking more pictures than ever before, with an average of 1.9 billion photographs captured each month in Britain and 328 million of these shared online, the poll found.